Boulder is much better off than other flood-ravaged Colorado communities, but the city still faces weeks, months and years of recovery, officials told the City Council at a Tuesday night meeting dedicated to flood issues.

Boulder officials did not put dollar figures on the damage to the city -- they said it will take weeks to complete a full assessment -- but a parade of department heads described torn-up streets, sewer infrastructure pummeled by rocks and open space trails turned into gullies 6 feet deep.

But they also described infrastructure that withstood historic natural forces. The city of Boulder did not lose a single bridge. The city's drinking water is safe to drink, despite one water treatment plant being down, possibly until next year.

No one is missing or unaccounted for in the city itself.

"We are in so much better shape than so many communities in Colorado," City Manager Jane Brautigam said.

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The three confirmed deaths and 109 "unaccounted for" were in Boulder County, not in the city limits.

Boulder Mayor Matt Appelbaum praised the efforts of city workers -- from police and firefighters to public works crews -- and said the Federal Emergency Management Agency wants to use Boulder and Boulder County as an example of effective interagency cooperation in the midst of a disaster.

"Boulder really did do a lot of things right," he said.

Nonetheless, there are significant ongoing challenges. City Council members said they support using city funds to pay for curbside flood debris pickup and to deal with the large amount of mud left over. However, there is no clear plan in place for the mud.

More than half the calls so far to a new public works hotline, 303-413-7100, have been about sewer backups.

Jeff Arthur, director of public works for utilities, said workers are pulling large rocks out of the sewer system, but they cannot address blockages in any widespread way until flood waters recede more.

"The entire system is completely full (of water)," he said. "Until we get some of the areas with infiltration to settle down, we won't have a good sense of where the blockages are. Even though there is not a truck in front of your house, we are working on it."

Boulder Police Chief Mark Beckner gave a dramatic account of the rapidly rising floodwaters. On Sept. 9, Boulder Creek was running at just 54 cubic feet per second. By 1 a.m. Thursday, the flow was more than 3,000 cubic feet per second. Waters went down overnight but started to rise again Thursday afternoon.

At the height of the flood Thursday night and early Friday morning, water in Boulder Creek was running at more than 5,000 cfs. Central Park was under water, and Canyon Boulevard was a river.

But more alarming in some ways -- because it was so unexpected -- was the water that poured off hillsides and flooded neighborhoods at higher elevations and that rose from every single drainageway in the city.

"What we were getting from the streets wasn't matching what our charts were telling us," Beckner said. "We had to throw the charts out."

Scott Hoffenberg said residents of the Flatirons neighborhood in western Boulder have worried for years about the potential for flooding from Gregory Canyon, particularly where the creek passes under a bridge near Seventh and Pennsylvania streets.

Arthur said the city is working with consultants to study where the water went and why, compared with previous flood mapping.

"Anecdotally, we're seeing a lot of things played out close to how we expected, and some areas where we were surprised," he said.

Brautigam said the city is working on several public outreach efforts, and those will include crowdsourcing tools for residents to share their eyewitness accounts, videos and photos of how the water behaved during the height of the flood.

Officials said the city's investment in flood-control measures paid off in the flood, which could have inflicted much more damage.

In many cases, the city's multi-use path system and bridge underpasses are designed to provide places for water to flow during a flood.

"They worked," Public Works Director Maureen Rait said.

That means many paths are still under water, but Rait said she is "cautiously optimistic" about the condition of those paths.

The Broadway bridge over Boulder Creek likely would have overtopped if it hadn't been raised during recent Broadway improvements, officials said.

The city has budgeted $24 million through 2019 for additional flood-control work, as well as $4.5 million in voter-approved bonds. Several of the areas targeted for improvements -- Wonderland Creek, Fourmile Canyon Creek and South Boulder Creek -- all saw heavy damage from last week's flooding.

The Boulder City Council also voted unanimously to extend an emergency declaration to Oct. 15, when the council will see another update on recovery efforts.

From left, Dan Feldheim, Scott Hoffenberg and John Smart pass sandbags as residents reinforced the dam on Seventh Street on University Hill in Boulder, Colorado, on Sunday September 15, 2013, as rains resumed and raised fears of more flooding in the community.
(Paul Aiken)

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